


when the time comes, forget the wrongs that I’ve done

by idrilhadhafang



Series: The Good Timeline [8]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, Star Wars: Rebels, The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Ahsoka Tano Needs a Hug, Alternate Reality, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Missing Scene From The Good Timeline, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker Feelings, Other, Past Injury Description
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-20
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-12 04:08:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28879239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idrilhadhafang/pseuds/idrilhadhafang
Summary: After learning more about Vader, Luke and Ahsoka mourn him together.
Series: The Good Timeline [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2107791
Kudos: 4
Collections: Bad Day Collection





	when the time comes, forget the wrongs that I’ve done

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I own nothing. 
> 
> Author’s Notes: Call this a missing scene from “The Good Timeline” that didn’t fit in anywhere else but needed to be written. Title from “Leave Out All The Rest” by Linkin Park.

It was while they were meeting, Luke, Ezra, Ahsoka and Mara, that Ahsoka proposed what Luke’s father’s ghost had told her — at least part of it. 

“You saw Vader?” Ezra said. 

Ahsoka actually did wince, and Luke couldn’t help but wince with her. Mara merely looked upon the scene with a sort of curiosity. 

“I did,” Ahsoka said. "He wasn’t Vader, though. He was Anakin again. Whatever wrongs he committed in life, he did do the right thing before he died.”

”Does it really mean everything else he did is all right, though?” Ezra said. “It’s all, admittedly, complicated. It does remind me of something Darth Traya said, about salvation being a relative thing."

”It may be,” Luke said. “Still, my father gave us valuable information on how to find Palpatine.”

“Finding him.” Mara sighed. “Before you get too excited, how are we even going to find Exegol? I was trained as the Emperor’s Hand, but it doesn’t mean I was let in on everything. If I was, I don’t know where I’d be.”

”We need a wayfinder,” Ahsoka said. 

“Well, before you get too excited, one of them’s in a place where you don’t really tread lightly,” Mara said. “Vader built his fortress there, but I think it was more trying to spite his old master. Mustafar’s pretty unstable in places. Lava hot enough to sear off human skin."

Ahsoka spoke up. “Was that how Anakin...got injured?”

Mara sighed. “I wouldn’t exactly say that Obi-Wan was merciful, if you get what I mean.”

Luke winced, picturing it. When he’d seen his father’s injuries, his father’s unmasked face, it was like the burns had long since healed at a terrible price. Learning more, about how Vader had to rely on a life support system to survive...

How could Obi-Wan even call that mercy? Leaving an almost completely limbless man to nearly burn to death. Even Palpatine “rescuing” Vader was most likely because he was still useful, not because of any legitimate affection for him. Vader hadn’t had anybody...for a long time. 

Ahsoka was staring ahead. Then, “We’ll have to do research on Mustafar. Its risks, its complications. It’s the best we can do.”

***

”Are you okay?” Luke said to Ahsoka. Outside, Mara and Ezra were talking. Planning. 

“It’s...hard,” Ahsoka said. “The more I learn about your father, the less I’m able to hate him. He did terrible things but...he nearly burned to death on Mustafar’s banks. He was alone. And Obi-Wan just left him there.” Then, "If just doesn’t seem right. Obi-Wan...he seemed to look at your father like the brother he never had.”

”I suppose you’d know more about it than me,” Luke said. 

Ahsoka nodded. “I don’t know if you saw it when he briefly trained you, but he could be very funny,” she said. “Snarky. He wasn’t as obviously demonstrative as your father in terms of caring for people, but it was there. I heard he even held a funeral for the man who killed his master, Qui-Gon. That was after Mustafar, but still...” She sighed. “The idea of Obi-Wan good as setting your mother up to be hurt, using her, cutting off your father’s limbs and leaving him to die...it had to be a moment of weakness on Obi-Wan’s part. Like, a brush with the Dark Side. The Dark Side doesn’t just prey on anger. It also preys on things like despair. I can imagine that he just...there was a holorecording on Coruscant and he actually argued against going to kill your father. Said he was like his brother."

Luke swallowed. As much as he didn’t understand Obi-Wan, he could at least understand his pain. He could imagine, Obi-Wan, no doubt younger and maybe less cynical, realizing the truth about the boy he good as raised. The sweet boy becoming a murderer. A monster. (A monster that turned back, but even so)

”Maybe he just...couldn’t, in the end,” Luke said. 

“Maybe. It’s not like him, leaving someone to burn to death.”

”Even when he told me about him, he focused on the good,” Luke said. “How he was the best pilot in the galaxy.”

Ahsoka laughed. “He was close enough.”

”A cunning warrior and a good friend. He said Anakin was dead, but he also remembered what came before.” In his heart, in his head. The good, kind man that Anakin was — Obi-Wan had kept it close enough, close to his heart. A man who took in all of life with a wink and had a great big heart. 

“That...does sound like Obi-Wan," Ahsoka said. “The man I knew.” Then, “We’re not doing it to avenge everyone we lost, though. We’re doing it for the sake of all life.”

”Yeah.” Luke swallowed. “We always have and always will.”


End file.
